Comic Review: Action Lab: Dog of Wonder #1

• Written by Scott Fogg and Vito Delsante
• Art by Rosy Higgins and Ted Brandt
• Letters by Full Court Press
• Published by Action Lab Entertainment
  

Before reading this comic, I'd never looked at the Action Lab logo. I'd seen it (having reviewed a few of their comics), but I never really noticed it. Now I see that it is a dog superhero, and that dog is a lab. Yes, that is Action Lab: Dog of Wonder. They made a comic entirely out of that one bad pun.

These are my kind of people.

Comic Review: Last Sons of America #1

• Written by Phillip Kennedy Johnson
• Illustrated by Matthew Dow Smith
• Colors by Doug Garbark
• Letters by Jim Campbell
• Cover by Tonci Zonjic
• Variant covers by Felipe Smith and Michael Dow Smith
• Published by BOOM! Studios

Last Sons of America is a really strange comic. It feels a lot like BOOM! is trying to make an Image Comic, with a very different style than I expect from them. It's going after big ideas in a very grimy and bleak world, and I found myself fascinated and intrigued, even though I'm not entirely sure why I like it.

Comic Review: The Goddamned #1

• Written by Jason Aaron
• Art by R. M. Guera
• Colors by Giulia Brusco
• Letters and Design by Jared K. Fletcher
• Variant Cover by Jock
• Published by Image Comics

All that this book had to do to hook me was call itself "Biblical Noir". One thing that comes with my religious background is that I really like stories that are based Biblical stories or ideas, but not the sanitized versions that pop up a little more often. I wouldn't quite agree that The Goddamned fits as noir, but it is Biblical and different from most that I see, so it has me from the start.

Comic Review: Limbo #1

• Created by Caspar Wijngaard and Dan Watters
• Writer: Dan Watters
• Artist: Caspar Wijngaard
• Lettering: Jim Campbell
• Published by Image Comics

Limbo is yet another in a larger than expected number of comics about Private Investigators that I've stumbled into recently. No, I don't mean that in the "Really, another one of these?" sense, as Limbo is a very different entry into that genre. It's the kind of thing that shows why this kind of story seems to last forever, since there is always something new that they can do with it.

Comic Review: Joe Golem: Occult Detective #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.

• Story by Mike Mignola and Christopher Golden
• Art by Patric Reynolds
• Colors by Dave Stewart
• Letters by Clem Robins
• Cover by Dave Palumbo
• Variant Cover by Mike Mignola and Dave Stewart

Trying to review something like this is difficult because I feel so mixed on different aspects of it. There are times that something is "all good" or "all bad", or feels overwhelmingly one way or the other, and that makes giving an opinion of it easier. When there are different parts, all of them working at different levels, it's harder to come to a conclusion. Joe Golem: Occult Detective falls right into this, with different storylines of wildly varying quality, and that makes it quite difficult to really talk about.

Comic Review: Johnny Red #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.

• Writer: Garth Ennis
• Art: Keith Burns
• Colors: Jason Worde
• Letters: Ron Steen
• Published by Titan Comics

Johnny Red will get a lot of attention just for the first name listed in the credits: Garth Ennis. He has a great reputation in comics, so any new releases with his name on it are going to get a lot of attention from the beginning. Even with his writing behind it, Johnny Red is a bit messy trying to get to the point that it becomes an interesting story.

Comic Review: Plants vs Zombies: Garden Warfare #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.

• Story by Paul Tobin
• Art and Cover by Jacob Chabot
• Colors by Matthew J. Rainwater
• Letters by Steve Dutro
• Published by Dark Horse Comics

The more time I spend with All-Ages comics, the more I think that I'm secretly 5 years old and just good at hiding it. Plants vs. Zombies: Garden Warfare is not only aimed straight at a young demographic, like other Plants vs Zombies comics, it fits a lot of the things that people don't really like about comics aimed at kids. Instead of hating it, though, I find a lot of joy in reading it.

Comic Review: Cyrus Perkins and the Haunted Taxi Cab #1

• Story, Letters, and Colors by Dave Dwonch
• Art and Tones by Anna Lencioni
• Published by Action Lab Comics

Cyrus Perkins and the Haunted Taxi Cab is kind of difficult to talk about. It's not overly complex, since most of the premise is in the title and first page of the story, but it works as an example of a problem that I often have with comics, and it's hard to tell if the problem is me or not. There is a lot that I like here, similar to my reaction to other comics from Action Lab, and without the way that it ends, it would be something that I absolutely love. The way that it ends gives me pause, and I can't tell if it's a failure of the book or of me.

Comic Review: The Rook #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.

• Script by Steven Grant
• Art by Paul Gulacy
• Colors by Jesus Aburto
• Lettering by Nate Piekos of Blambot
• Published by Dark Horse Comics

Going off of the synopsis, The Rook sounds like something I would absolutely love. The idea of someone fighting a one-man war against a time-traveling terrorist is the kind of high concept thing that I love to see people do. While I like the concept, this issue doesn't do a lot to give me confidence that the rest of the series is going to match up to its potential.

Comic Review: EVE Valkyrie #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.

• Script by Brian Wood
• Art by Eduardo Francisco
• Colors by Michael Atiyeh
• Lettering by Michael Heisler
• Published by Dark Horse Comics

Admittedly, EVE: Valkyrie has an uphill battle to fight as a comic series. It is based on a spinoff of EVE Online, which is a Virtual Reality Space Combat Video Game, a string of words that feels like it's designed to blow your mind with its potential. Even without that to live up to, it looks and feels like a rather generic version of a story about space combat, which is disappointing.

Comic Review: The Paybacks #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.

• Script by Donny Cates and Eliot Rahal
• Art by Geoff Shaw
• Colors by Lauren Affe
• Letters by Michael Heisler
• Published by Dark Horse Comics

I don't know for sure, but it feels like The Paybacks is a concept that has been done before. It has to; taking out loans to get the gadgets to become a superhero, then needing superpowered repossessors when you cannot pay feels both original, but is such a great idea that someone has to have tried it before. Unlike the hypothetical version I can see in my head, The Paybacks is not full of 90s grim and gritty, but is bright and colorful and fun, not like I've come to expect from most alternate superhero stories that publishers other than the Big Two love to publish.

Comic Review: I Hate Fairyland #1

• Story and art by Skottie Young
• Colors by Jean-Francois Beaulieu
• Lettering by Nate Piekos of Blambot
• Logo and Design by Rian Hughes
• Published by Image Comics

There are a few creators that I will be interested in anything that they do, and Skottie Young has become one of those for me. I just had so much fun reading his Rocket Raccoon series, and now he has a series, I Hate Fairyland, with Image? No need to convince me further, just let me have the book.

Comic Review: Lara Croft and the Frozen Omen #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.

• Script by Corinna Bechko
• Pencils by Randy Green
• Inks by Andy Owens
• Colors by Michael Atiyeh
• Letters by Michael Heisler
• Published by Dark Horse Comics

The first interesting thing I noticed about this comic is the title, Lara Croft and the Frozen Omen. Tomb Raider is not in the title, which is both apt because there are no tombs, and an admission that Lara is well enough known that her name should be able to carry the marketing. With the change in the games to focus more on storytelling and Lara as a character, which the title here is hinting at, it could be a good shift for the series as a whole. The real question is that this is a video game tie-in comic, which don't have a great history, and will they bring that storytelling care here as well?

Comic Review: Dead Vengeance #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.

• Script and Pencils by Bill Morrison
• Inks by Keith Champagne
• Colors by Carlos Badilla
• Letters by Nate Piekos
• Published by Dark Horse Comics

When I previewed upcoming comics, all I needed to be sold on Dead Vengeance was the tagline: Dead Private Investigator Tries to Solve His Own Murder. It's a great start for a high concept story idea, and the opening scenes match that good start. We have John Dover, former radio personality, waking up after he's been dead for 10 years, trying to figure out what happened to him. It's set in 1940 and is really going for a noir tone, so you can probably guess what the story is setting you up for.

Comic Review: Saints #1

• Writer: Sean Lewis
• Artist: Benjamin Mackey
• Published by Image Comics

Even though I'm spoiling the rest of the review, I did not like Saints. Looking at this week's preview, I liked the premise. Unfortunately, the synopsis almost felt like it was coming from another story, not being inaccurate, but not the way I would have interpreted the story.

Comic Review: Paper Girls #1

• Writer: Brian K. Vaughan
• Artist: Cliff Chiang
• Colors: Matt Wilson
• Letters and Design: Jared K. Fletcher
• Published by Image Comics

The only thing it took to get me to read Paper Girls was the first credit: Brian K. Vaughan. Saga is my favorite currently running comic, and for that alone I will give everything he writes a shot, even here when I'm a bit shakier on the premise of the book.

Comic Review: Mirror's Edge: Exordium #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.

• Script by Christofer Emgard
• Art by Mattias Haggstrom and Robert Sammelin
• Colors by Davi Correia
• Letters by Michael Heisler
• Published by Dark Horse Comics

I have almost no experience with the Mirror's Edge game, save playing through the demo a few times. It still made enough of an impact that, when I saw this comic was out there, I was interested in seeing what it had to offer. If you don't have experience with the game, don't worry; everything you need to know to jump in is summed up on the first page.

Comic Review: Power Cubed #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.

• Written and illustrated by Aaron Lopresti
• Colors by Hi-Fi Design
• Letters by Michael Heisler
• Published by Dark Horse Comics

I am a sucker for ridiculous concepts for a story. Make it as stupidly over the top as possible, with ideas that seem to have nothing to do with each other and could never work together, and I'm going to be predisposed to wanting to read it. Power Cubed falls right into that category, having a mix of all sorts of elements that don't seem to fit together. If done wrong, however, that makes these comics doubly disappointing - not only bad, but a bad example of something I love. Fortunately for it, Power Cubed is so far a good, if not great example of that kind of insanity, teetering right on the edge of great and disaster, and tipping over towards great. 

Comic Review: Wild's End: Enemy Within #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.

• Written by Dan Abnett
• Illustrated and Lettered by I. N. J. Culbard
• Published by BOOM! Studios

Last year, there was a miniseries called Wild's End, about a village that was caught in the middle of an alien invasion. Don't worry if you haven't read it, since I didn't read it either, and it's not really required reading for the new series, Wild's End: Enemy Within. Enemy Within manages to stand on its own, and works well as a story set in the aftermath of an alien invasion.

Comic Review: Danger Girl: Renegade #1

This was originally posted as a review for Word of the Nerd. Reposted here with slight modifications.

• Written by Andy Hartnell
• Art by Stephen Molnar
• Colors by John Rauch
• Letters by Neil Uyetake
• Edits by Scott Dunbier
• Published by IDW Publishing

Before reading this issue, I didn't know that Danger Girl had an established history in comics. As it turns out, that is a very good thing. Danger Girl: Renegade #1 makes me want to read more, and its back catalogue means I don't have to wait for a new issue to get more.